Free perk: Critics have spoken out against the benefit given to partners of TfL staff

Transport for London today came under pressure to scrap a benefit scheme which provides free travel to partners of staff and others.

Almost 22,000 free travel cards are handed out each year to a person nominated by a staff member. Beneficiaries can be a spouse, housemate or lodger.

TfL says there is no cost to the scheme but critics point to the loss in fare revenue and claim that scrapping the “over generous” benefit could save the taxpayer £17.8 million a year. The criticism comes as TfL faces budget cuts from central government and pressure to meet pledges to minimise fare increases.

The Standard understands that TfL, which has an annual budget of about £9 billion, will have its government grant cut by £150 million in 2014-15 with more modest annual cuts of £30-£50 million in the two years before that.

“Our estimates say that in excess of £17 million could be saved by cutting this benefit, money that could be used to fund further council tax cuts for Londoners already suffering from significant increases in the cost of living.”

A TfL spokeswoman said: “The cost of providing free travel to staff and their nominees on TfL services is nil, given that much of this travel is for work purposes and the remainder is insufficient to require additional services to be operated to cope with it.

“Any additional revenue generated if nominee passes were withdrawn would be very small given that not all nominees use the benefit to any significant extent.”

The Assembly Tories claim there were 21,788 passes in use last year — a rise from 15,897 over the previous year. It calculated that the passes were worth an annual £35.8 million and the loss in revenue was approximately half of this — £17.8 million.

TfL has committed to making “efficiency” savings of £7.6 billion over the next decade.

But frontline services on bus and Tubes are protected and there is pressure to increase savings as a proportion of the organisation’s budget.